Love is All Around
by beware of trips
Summary: They weren't high school sweethearts, but their romance felt a lot more real than some others. The story of how Fred and Mary came together (and fell apart).
1. Chapter 1

Love Is All Around

On Sunday, her dad and brothers play Tetris loading boxes, suitcases, and bags into her VW Beetle. All the while, her dad hums the theme song to The Mary Tyler Moore Show – Mary's song, Mary Taylor's namesake – until the whole family is singing along.

She leaves for Chicago on Monday morning, but before she does, she kisses Fred at the end of her driveway. A slow, lingering kiss that she presses six years of complicated feelings into. They smile against each other's lips and she tells him she'll see him at Christmas. As he pedals away on his bike, she wonders if things will ever be the same between them.

She drives the eight hours to The University of Chicago on her own. Her roommate is painfully shy and, for the first time in her life, Mary gets to be the dominate friend. The one who decides where they go and what they do. Years of playing second fiddle to girls like Hermione Nichols and Alice Smith prepare her for this role and she's a little disappointed, but not surprised, that the part isn't as rewarding as she hoped. If there was a cheerful one of their bunch, it had always been Mary, not Hermione or Alice.

Every week Fred sends her a letter and actually calls on her 19th birthday. She's only been gone a month, but the ten minute conversation might as well be with a stranger. They suffer through small talk and she makes an excuse to hang up. She rereads his letters in bed that night, wondering why things couldn't be as simple as they were in words. She's sure this is how she loses him. Not with a bang, but with an uncomfortable phone call.

When she goes home for Christmas, he turns up at her house one night and drags her to Pops in his new Ford pickup that he'd brought preowned from Mantle's Used Cars. They sit in Pops until the early hours of the morning, laughing over old times and sharing milkshakes. Things feel the way they used to that night. When he drops her off, they shared a chaste kiss. She goes back to school a week later.

Her second semester, she loads up on classes, determined to graduate in three years instead of four. (Why else had she suffered through all those AP courses senior year?) She drags her roommate to a corny Valentine's Day party in the next building over. She meets Todd there and goes on three dates with him before deciding it was time to lose her virginity.

It's quick, a little painful, and totally uncomfortable. Pretty much everything Hermione assured her it was be all those years ago. (Alice insisted her first time was magical, but even Virgin Mary called bullshit on that one.) They go on two more dates before Mary gathers up the nerve to break it off with him.

At the end of the semester, she meets Brian at the library and they hit it off. They agree to be exclusive over the summer, even though they probably won't be able to each other. Mary goes back to Riverdale and spends another summer at Fred's side. She tells him about Brian and he tells her about the couple of girls he's dated and she's genuinely happy for him. She hopes he's happy for her as well.

The go see Forrest Gump at the Bijou one night and they both end up crying during it. They laugh in the car over what softies they both are. Fred shoots her _that look_ and it takes all her power not to melt into him. When the moment passes, he drives her home without another word about it.

And that, she thinks, it why she's always loved him. He never pushes her into anything, even when she knows he wants it.

She sees Hermione a few times before she goes to spend a month in London with Hiram Lodge. If it hurts Fred that Hermione is still in Riverdale with him, he doesn't let on. He swears they're friends now. Better friends than they were before they dated.

Alice and Hal don't come back for the summer from Boston. From what she pieces together, something about Hal's parents finding out they were living together instead of dorming. Mary feels guilty about how shitty she left things with Alice the previous summer and calls her. Alice talks her ear off about how wonderful Boston is and how she takes class in the morning and works as a waitress at night (and how Hal works in at a garage in the morning and takes classes at night) and how they've settled into domestic bliss and honestly, Mary, I just don't see us ever going back to Riverdale.

Mary relays this information to Fred and FP one night over dinner at Pops. The two roll their eyes at one another, but don't say a word. Mary silently wonders how many bridges Alice (and by extension Hal) burned before they left town.

She goes back to Chicago in September and keeps up her relationship with Brian. He's sweet and she likes spending time with him. They have sex and it's so much better than it was the two times with Todd. When Forrest Gump comes out on VHS, they rent it and watch it at Brian's friend's apartment. He and his friends call it "feel good trash" and want to watch it again to roast it. When Mary speaks up about enjoying it even more the second time around, they all shoot her a condescending look, including Brian.

She decides she really doesn't have time for a boyfriend if she wants to graduate in three more semesters.

When she heads home that summer, Fred's mom tells her that he and FP are down in Centerville for another four weeks working on a new mini mall. She tries calling a few times, but to no avail. Hermione invites her to spend two weeks with her family in the Hamptons and Mary takes her up on the offer. She gets to know Hiram and hardly recognizes her old friend while she's around him. She waits on him hand and foot, takes his suggestions about what outfit to wear, always asks him how she should wear her hair that day. It's a complete 180 from the way she was with Fred. (And a large part of Mary thinks that's why Hermione chose Hiram instead.)

When Mary gets back to Riverdale, there's a simple card with her name and an address in the mailbox. She goes to said address and discovers Fred and FP have finally gotten the apartment they'd been talking about since high school. She spends her last weeks of summer helping them unpack and trying to make their place look more like a home. She breaks up one particular nasty fight between the boys when they get into an argument over which poster should be hung over the couch. Fred says Springsteen and FP says Metallica and Mary threatens to rip up both posters if they don't cut it out. In the end, there's plenty of room for both.

She's so exhausted one night, she falls asleep on their couch and when she wakes up at 3 am, she finds herself alone in Fred's room. When she peeks into the living room, Fred is asleep on the couch, feet dangling over the edge. She laughs at the image of him dragging her to bed. She kisses his sleeping figure on the forehead and goes back to sleep.

She tells Fred she's definitely graduating in the spring and he gets excited at the prospect of her coming home. She starts talking about law school and sees his face sink a little. It makes a lot of sense to choose a school in Chicago, where she has so many choices. He says he understands.

Fred simply calls the morning of her leaving and says his goodbyes. She imagines him chasing her on his bike as she drives through town limits, but that doesn't happen.

On her 21st birthday, she spots a familiar boy sitting on the steps outside her dorm, flowers in hand. She nearly drops her books as she steadies herself against the banister and tries to figure out if Fred Andrews is really sitting outside her dorm all the way in Chicago.

He stands up and, before she knows what's happen, her books are strewn on the concrete and Fred has her in his arms. Their lips are pressed together, they breathe through each other's mouths. She runs her fingers through his hair and he strokes her cheek. When they break apart, a few stranglers walking to class actually applaud them.

She skips all her classes that day and sticks a chair under the doorknob. She and Fred make love for the first time and it's everything she ever hoped it would be and more.

He stays for three days, much to the annoyance of her roommate. Mary walks around in a state of bliss for weeks because for the first time ever she is able to proudly proclaim _Fred fucking Andrews is my boyfriend_.

No one in Chicago may care, but it's a pretty big deal for Riverdale.

She spends most of Christmas break in Fred and FP's apartment. The three of them watch the boy's favorite Christmas movie (Die Hard) nearly every day. Mary bakes, Fred watches, and FP steals handfuls of raw cookie dough because he thinks it's funny when Mary smacks him with a wooden spoon. They make several jokes about being a happy little family – mom, dad, and obnoxious teenage son. Like a slap to the face, Mary realizes how very happy she is. How she wants to be a lawyer, but not at risk of giving this up.

The night before she goes back he tells her he loves her. He presses a fingers to her lips and makes her promise not to say it back until she's one hundred percent sure she means it. She spends her eight hour drive with her heart thumping out of her chest.

She applies to the small law program offered at John Adams University in Greendale. It's not very competitive, not highly ranked, but she convinces herself going to The University of Chicago for another three years will simply be paying for a name. Law programs are all the same.

For the first time, she makes the drive home for spring break. Fred teases her mercilessly over not saying she loves him back yet. One night, as she's just drifting off to sleep, he whispers _I love you, Mary_ in her ear and she mutters back _I love you too, Fred_. She shoots up in bed and he laughs at how surprised she is at her own words.

She tells him then and there about moving home, law school in Greendale. He cries and tells her to think it over. That he can't be the sole reason she comes back.

His cheek is wet when she touches it. _It's you, Fred. It's always been you_.

Fred tags along with her family when they come to Chicago for graduation. Her parents always liked Fred and seem impressed he's a foreman already. They know not everyone is cut out for college and they don't hold being working class against him. They respect him for it even.

Hal and Alice show up midsummer. Mary doesn't ask, but she assumes they've worked out whatever problems they were having with his family. The girls meet for lunch at Pops and Mary's taken back by the sullen girl who sits across from her. She pokes and prods, but it's not until Alice reaches across the table to grab the sugar that Mary sees the diamond sparkling from Alice's finger.

 _Oh, Alice_. Mary is gleeful, taking the girl's hand to get a better look. When she looks up, Alice's eyes are brimming with tears. Mary jumps to the other side of the booth to hug her.

 _Do you ever think you don't deserve nice things?_

The question takes Mary back because she never felt that way in her life. In fact, Mary thinks she deserves a lot of nice things she never gets and is shocked Alice doesn't feel the same way.

Alice admits in shame what she did and how Hal forgave her with the engagement ring he'd been sitting on for two years. Mary assures her Hal never would have asked if he didn't really love her and want to marry her. Alice calms down.

Mary springs her own news on her – about graduation, law school, Fred – and is disappointed by Alice's reaction. Her blonde friend insists moving back to Riverdale is a mistake and dating Fred is a disaster waiting to happen.

Mary spends the rest of lunch with a sour taste in her mouth and doesn't return another of Alice's calls. Maybe this is a bridge Mary needs to burn herself.

Mary moves into the apartment with the boys as school starts. The three of them make their own little happy family (with the revolving door of FP's conquests joining them every so often). They are happy.

She brings Fred as her plus one to Alice and Hal's wedding in the summer. FP is not invited and refuses to let on that it bothers him. During the ceremony, as she watches her old friends with smiles plastered on their faces, she remembers how jealous she was of them in high school. She never wanted to be Alice or be with Hal, but their relationship always seemed so easy to her.

For the first time in her life, everything is easy for her and Fred and she only feels happiness for the newly crowned Coopers. She's almost disappointed when the two head back to Boston instead of moving home, like she did.

At the end of summer, they get another wedding invitation. Hermione Nichols and Hiram Lodge are to be wed at on New Year's Eve in Manhattan. Mary laughs at the very idea of it, but can't say no. It will be the poshest wedding she'll ever attend.

Fred flat out refuses to go and they have their first big fight. Over his ex-girlfriend.

In the end, Mary brings her 17-year-old brother and they have a blast. She makes an excuse about Fred having the flu and sees a flicker of sadness in Hermione's eyes that he didn't show.

Fred doesn't ask about the wedding and she doesn't tell. They don't mention it again.

On Fred's 23rd birthday, a beautiful May day, she packs a picnic basket and they go to Sweetwater River. They lie on their backs after they eat, watching the clouds lazily drift by. He takes her hand and starts playing with her fingers. When he finally stops, she feels a slight weight on one of them and gasps when she looks at it.

The ring isn't as fancy Hermione's and not as big as Alice's even, but it's perfect.

She tackles him with kisses, getting lipstick over his face and scolding him for not asking.

He didn't need to ask, they both know, because he already knew the answer.


	2. Chapter 2

Love is All Around

They don't want a long engagement, but life, school, and work get in the way. Longer engagement – more money for a wedding.

That is until FP's mom – bless her soul – passes away and FP sells her house. For the first time ever, he's sitting on more money than he needs to get to his next paycheck. Mary knows the idea of all that money scares him. And then Fred chimes in with an idea. It comes out so fast, Mary's sure the boys have been discussing it for a while and now is merely the time to get her on board.

Go into business for themselves. Start their own company. Andrews-Jones Construction. They know half the guys on the team would follow them if they left. However, this would mean giving up their own savings – their wedding money.

Mary agrees full heartedly. It's not about the wedding, it's about the marriage. And owning a business is an investment in their future. They cancel the hall they've rented and decide that a modest wedding in her parent's yard that summer will do just fine.

One Friday during her last semester, as marriage, graduation, and the bar exam all tiptoe closer and closer, her car breaks down outside a bar and grill in Greendale. She goes inside to use the phone and orders a gin and tonic while she waits for Fred to pick her up. The place has live music, a lone girl sitting at a piano singing. When she starts her rendition of Allentown, Mary takes a good look at her and almost spits her drink out.

Gladys Cohen, all grown up and returned to Riverdale. Well, Greendale at least.

Gladys takes her break and she and Mary huddle over a back table, exchanging stories and catching up. Last she saw Gladys was six years ago – freshly turned 15 and crying as her parents dragged her to Toledo and away from the small life she'd made in Riverdale. Now nearly 21 and out in the world on her own. She bites her nails as she gives Mary the low down. The depression. Having a little "accident" with sleeping pills her senior year. Spending a few months in the hospital and then dropping out of school because she already missed enough and wasn't about to repeat the year.

She takes Mary's hands and smiles. Gladys was never much of a smiler and the look is strange on her. She tells her about therapy. About wanting to get better and how getting away from her over bearing family and being independent was helping. How she headed back towards Riverdale way six months ago because, damn it, she just liked the air upstate.

Six months? Mary asks her why she hadn't looked up FP in all that time. She shrugs.

They exchange numbers and Mary tells her FP lives with them. She goes home and fills him in, expecting him to revert back to his 18-year-old self and sweep the girl off her feet.

He shrugs.

Mary goes two days in a state of agitation. On Monday morning, she wakes up to Gladys, shoes in hand, trying to sneak out of their apartment without making any noise. Mary squeals so loudly she wakes up both boys and the four share a hug in the hallway.

Their wedding falls on an impossibly hot day at the end of June, so they pass out paper fans to everyone. Even the sweat can't ruin their day. Gladys plays all the songs for the ceremony and a few for the reception. FP's already a little drunk by the time he needs to make a speech. He talks for nearly twenty minutes, but has the crowd in hysterics for most of the time. Both sets of parents go up and present them with a key and piece of paper – together, they've placed a hefty down payment on a house on Elm Street. A fixer upper, but nothing Fred and FP can't handle.

Her dad puts on Joan Jett's cover of the Mary Tyler Moore theme during the reception and their family and friends form a circle dancing around her and Fred as it plays. They laugh so hard they start crying.

The Coopers attend, Alice with a baby bump proudly displayed under her dress. Every time Mary glances their way, Alice, Hal, or a passerby seems to be rubbing her belly. In typical Alice fashion, she beams and eats up the attention. Mary ignores it. Fred can't wait to be a dad, so she knows it'll be her turn soon enough.

The Lodges do not attend and send their regards in the form of a crystal punch bowl from Tiffanys.

They move out of the apartment and into their new home on Elm Street, located right next to where Hal's parents live. As the boys patch the roof and repaint, they make jokes about how funny it will be to watch the couple visit with all the hell spawn they plan on having. _God help us all if those kids wind up anything like little Allie._

Mary pointedly reminds the boys that they were no angels when they were young either. The jokes don't die and they get a birth announcement in November when round-faced little Polly is born.

The first miscarriage happens right before Christmas. The second in September, around Mary's birthday. And the third right after New Years.

The doctor assures them these things happen. The important thing is she's able to get pregnant.

Andrews-Jones Construction is thriving and she's doing great at the small firm she works at downtown. The house has shaped up and even though they want a baby, they take a break from trying. It's become exhausting.

In April, Gladys calls her in tears telling her she needs to talk. Mary finally feels like she's found a best friend in Gladys. Her childhood friendships with Hermione and Alice felt like a whole lot of give give give without getting much back. She and Gladys are equals. It doesn't matter if Mary is a college graduate and Gladys is a high school dropout – they understand one another.

When she gets to the old apartment, Gladys pulls her into the bathroom and hands her a pregnancy test. It takes Mary a few minutes to gather that Gladys isn't just upset about the surprise pregnancy. She feels like she's taken something away from Mary by getting pregnant. How can they have a baby when she and Fred want one so bad? But then, how can she not have the baby when people around her are trying so hard? And geez, what will FP say?

Mary's heart both swells and breaks when she realizes she knows about this baby before FP.

She waits until she's home before she lets the tears flow. Fred finds her curled up in bed with a pint of melting ice cream on the bedside table. They'll keep trying, they decide. The Andrews aren't quitters.

What does surprise them both is the next day when FP and Gladys announce they're getting married. Gladys is all smiles and FP looks so proud and, while Mary has a funny feeling about the whole ordeal, she decided to keep her mouth shut. FP is miles from the playboy he was in high school (the playboy he was even two years ago) and Gladys is stable and healthy and damn it, Mary supports her friends.

They get married in the courthouse before Gladys is showing and have a small party in backyard on Elm Street. Gladys sets up her keyboard and FP pulls his out-of-tune guitar from the grave and they play a rendition of Leather and Lace.

FP must really love her, she and Fred decide, if he'd sing a Stevie Nicks song for her.

She finds out in the summer Alice is pregnant again when old Mrs. Cooper next door mentions how another miracle is coming into the family, and _yes, maybe another mistake, but a miracle all the same._ Alice never calls her to share the news.

Mary throws up once at the end of summer and Fred runs out to by a pregnancy test. It's positive and _this is the one_. They both feel it.

Gladys gives birth to little Forsythe in the beginning of October, just as Mary's being told she needs to go on bedrest. Five months in bed with Gladys and the baby at her side. She sees the quietness come back to Gladys, the sullen girl she was in high school. Mary casually asks one day if she went back to taking her antidepressants, but Gladys snaps at her and Mary brings it up to FP in private next time.

 _I think that's her own business, Mare._

He comes in February. A day that's bitterly cold and snowy and wet and the exact opposite of their wedding. He comes into the world quiet as anything and Mary's heart almost stops when she takes him in her arms for the first time, Fred clutching her side and kissing her forehead and telling her how much he loves them both.

Their little Archibald. Their Archie. Their _son_. She's always known love but this is another level entirely.

Fred and FP are ecstatic. Two men, two sons, a set of built in best friends.

Mary goes back to work after four months and Gladys watches Archie during the day. The two couples slowly shift from overwhelmed-new-parents back to normal. Or as normal as you get with two little boys running under your feet. _At least we're all doing it together_.

Fred is the picture perfect father. He does diapers, midnight feedings, playtime. All of it with her. She could do this another five times if it meant seeing her husband in dad mode.

Only the doctors don't leave her a lot of hope of getting pregnant again. She was lucky to carry Archie to term and even he came nearly a month early. Pregnancy was hard on her body.

But they have their family. Smaller than they might have hoped, but a family nonetheless.

Gladys and FP fight a lot more. Never in hushed whispers either. While Gladys may have once been quiet, she's as much of a screamer as FP is when she's angry. They step outside, they argue. About money, about home, the baby, their families. When the boys are two, she hears FP call Forsythe Jughead. Gladys slaps him and takes the screaming toddler to the car, wounded husband in tow.

Fred tells her later it's a name for people who're slow and maybe their pediatrician said Forsythe's development may not be at what it should at his age.

But the name sticks, to Gladys's annoyance. Jughead, Jug, Juggie. _Anything is better than Forsythe, after all._

By the time the kids are four, Mary is shocked how they've become two little _people_. Archie is tall and loud and impulsive and any worries doctors may have had about Jughead's development are unfound because he's already learned to read under Gladys's watch. She tries teaching Archie, but in vain. Her sticky-handed son would rather dump buckets of sand over his head than look at a book.

That same year, the Coopers retire from the Riverdale Register and plan to move to Florida. Fred's mom is still the best realtor in town, but they don't list the house because their son and daughter-in-law are finally moving back to town to take over the paper. Alice and Hal, back in Riverdale at last.

The Cooper girls, Polly and Betty, are two golden-haired angels. Mary just assumed all kids were rowdy and loud, but comes to a realization that maybe it's just their kids that are like that. The girls can't come over to play without Alice watching over the fence and Fred asks Alice one day if he should just tear it down all together so she doesn't have to crane her neck all the time.

They settle into a bit of a routine, Mary and Fred. Archie goes to school, they go to work, come home for dinner, repeat. It's not the glamourous life she dreamed of as a kid, but she has a good job (if not all that challenging) and a happy family and that's what matters. Right?

Gladys comes to the house with Jughead in the middle of the night just before kindergarten begins. They settle Jughead to sleep in Archie's room and Gladys tells them she's leaving, packing her bags, going back to Toledo to be with her parents. She won't take the drinking anymore, the late night jobs.

Fred raps his knuckles on the table a few times and leaves. FP shows up the next morning and Fred lightly pushes Gladys to give her husband another chance.

They fight that day, her and Fred. They go to the garage while Archie's playing a video game and, even though neither of them are yellers, the screams don't stop. Mary wants to protect her friend, but so does Fred. They've known FP forever, Gladys is practically new.

In the end, it's not their marriage. They have no control over what other people do.

Two months later, the Jones's announce they're expecting another baby. The smiles return to their faces and Gladys seems less sullen. Maybe it was just a bump in the road. Little Forsythia is born eight months later. Jughead tells everyone who will listen to him that his sister's name is actually Jellybean and it sticks.

Archie demands a little sister as well. They ponder explaining the technicalities of it all, but wind up just getting him a dog instead. Vegas.

Routine over takes them again, only their family now involves an over-active labrador retriever to match their over-active redhead son.

When Archie is in third grade she asks Fred at what point they stopped referring to time by years or ages and instead by what grade their son is in. Fred doesn't think it's as funny as she does.

When the kids are in six grade (and Jellybean kindergarten), FP gets arrested. Mary stays with the kids while Fred and Gladys go to the police station. They come back in the early hours of the morning. Gladys mutters a thanks to Mary without looking at her. She takes her sleep deprived kids by the hands and sticks them in the truck.

Fred buys FP out of the company and doesn't give Mary much in the way of details. She pries a few times, but that just leads to snappy comments and Mary is above that. Fred is too.

She thinks it makes her a bad person, but sometimes she spies on Hal and Alice when they fight. They always head out to the backyard and it's not until Fred catches her one day, with the kitchen window open and the curtains closed, that he points out the girl's bedrooms are in the front of the house. They probably can't hear from there.

Kids don't need to hear, Mary thinks. They tend to just know.

She sees Jughead's grades slipping in school, but Gladys chalks it up to middle school and that apathetic attitude all preteens get. Mary goes out of her way to talk to Gladys, who now balances her job at the bakery in the morning with bartending at night. FP, she promises Mary, is making money one way or another. Part of her wants to tell Gladys to leave him, but she knows it's not her place and, as much as he's messed his life up, FP is still her friend.

Whenever she brings up FP at home, Fred gets in a mood and after a while, she just stops bringing him up together. Jughead still comes over for Archie, but they tend to go out more now that they're older. She's grateful Fred doesn't take out any of his hostility on the kid.

On a whim, when Archie is in the 7th grade, Mary emails a firm she interned at in Chicago when she was an undergrad. They offer her a position at a higher rate than she's been making her fifteen years in Riverdale.

She holds off telling Fred. Fred, who is so Riverdale he almost bleeds plaid and maple syrup. Fred, who's only ever gone as far as Chicago because of her. Fred is the very life of Riverdale, the heart and the soul. She knows he'd probably go to the end of the earth for her, but it'd break his heart to leave this place that is _so him._

She brings it up when the offer has been pending for weeks. He isn't mad and he isn't surprised. He just sighs.

 _You're so much bigger than Riverdale, Mary._

It isn't goodbye, but she knows he won't come with her. He chased her to Chicago once and she could never ask him to do it again. They sit Archie down and lay all their cards on the table. It's entirely his choice and no one will be upset by what he decides.

Mary knows they don't even need to have a talk. It's not about choosing Mary or Fred, choosing Mom or Dad. It's about choosing Chicago or Riverdale.

Archie is just as Riverdale as Fred. He eats, sleeps, and breathes Riverdale. Chicago doesn't stand a chance.

The summer between 7th and 8th grade, Archie and Fred load up a rented U-Haul with her stuff. The firm set her up with an apartment and she just has to survive the eight hour drive in one piece. Her son stands at the end of the driveway, waving her away in the rearview mirror. He doesn't chase after her because she told him not to.

Fred stands with his hands in his pockets, sad smile on his face. This isn't divorce. This isn't even forever. She came back to Riverdale for him once, there's no saying she won't do it again.

At one point life became less about her and him and more about everything else. She spends the first half of her drive trying to pin point that one moment, but can't. She turns on the radio instead and fiddles with the dial until a local station comes in clear.

Joan Jett sings _This world is awfully big, this time you're all alone._


End file.
